Breaking Slowly // h.s. au

Chapter Six

Chapter Six

*Elsie*

Songs-

Teenagers- My Chemical Romance

The Big Bang- Rock Mafia

Say it, Just Say it- The Mowgli's

Miss Jackson- Panic! At the Disco

A silence takes over us for a brief moment as everything is still spinning around us like we're in an ongoing storm.

"I should have never left you." He says. I furrow my eyebrows and cock my head.

"What do you mean?" I ask slowly.

"I should have never left you that first day." He shakes his head, "You were so nice and genuine, unlike the others at that fucking school." He grits his teeth, "I just wanted to fit in. And I let everyone else convince me that you were- something you're not." He finishes looking down.

I stay silent and pick at the skin around my finger nails.

"I wish you had stayed." I say. He looks at me like he's been wounded. Like I just struck him with the reality of it, "But we didn't know each other Harry. I understand why you did what you did."

"How can you?" He asks shaking his head, "How can you understand something I did when I don't even understand it?"

"I don't know." I speak up, "I just understand that it's hard to be the new kid, let alone the foreign new kid and- I- I get it." I finish quietly and he squeezes my hand.

"I shouldn't have done it-," he starts. If he keeps beating himself up over it no one is going to feel better.

"Harry you don't have to-," I begin to explain but he puts his hand on my thigh to silence me.

"Please let me." He sighs. I stay silent, basically granting him access to speak his mind, "You are one of the nicest, realest people I met that first day. Everyone else I knew was fake. Don't get me wrong I was thrilled to be accepted but I shouldn't have left you."

"That's the thing." I say stopping him, "You couldn't have left me because you didn't know me. We didn't know each other and-."

"I saw what happened that day." He sighs. I only have to think for a second before I know exactly what he's talking about. The first time Alex hit me, "I was waiting for Alex to come so we could drive home together." He pauses, "And I saw him hit you."

I am kind of paralyzed. I didn't think anyone saw.

Alex had cornered me after his first day and apparently knew everything about me. Mostly lies and rumors spread by my fellow classmates and- as the teachers call it- "allies". I was crying and he was spewing insults at me and I shoved him because he called Jen and Mara pathetic fags and he hit me. Straight in the cheek. He walked off and I cried against the wall for hours until I ran home half dead inside. The rest of me died in the months following when everything got worse.

I never thought anyone saw us that day. I never thought anyone knew that he did that. He didn't hit me again until three months later but still it gave me some kind of piece no one knew I was that weak, that early on.

"Y-you did?" I ask with wide eyes and a croaky voice.

"Yeah." He sighs. The memory sends chills down my spine and I try to shake the feeling but it keeps returning, "I am so sorry Else." He says slowly. His words are defined as he looks straight into my eyes and squeezes my hand, "I am so- so sorry." His eyes are glassy and I know that he's all tough and stuff at school but I've seen this Harry in the past couple days and I know that's just a front.